Rip Current Brewing

Go Against the Flow

Paul

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Barrel-aged Reserve Cuvee Blend #1 Bottle Release

On Friday, November 9th, both tasting rooms will be selling the remaining (after the brief on-line bottle pre-sale) 500ml bottles of Bourbon Barrel-aged Reserve Cuvee Blend #1 for $18 (plus tax and crv). We don’t expect the remaining bottles to last long, so be sure to arrive early to taste it on tap and buy your share.

Reserve Cuvee Blend #1 features a complex palate of flavors imparted by the four barrel-aged components included in the blend. Every one of the component beers spent at least 18 months in fresh bourbon barrels! First, we used the bourbon barrel-aged version of our GABF medal-winning Black Lagoon Scottish Strong. This scotch ale provides the silky smooth foundation and contributes flavors of dark caramel, figs, oak tannins, and bourbon character.

Next, we added 3 unreleased barrel aged beers to build out the flavor framework. Barrel-aged End of the World Double Imperial Stout was added to contribute coffee, dates, toffee, and molasses character along with a deeper bourbon richness. Barrel-aged Buckwheat Old Ale adds a complex dark honey and buckwheat flavor and sublime oak tannins. Finally, Barrel-aged Wakeboarding Wheatwine imparts a rich toasty malt flavor and a full body with some bourbon spiciness. The resulting cuvee blend has a very broad array of flavors challenging your senses with every sip while finishing with a mellow warming from its 14% ABV as it goes down.

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Triple IPA Can and Tap Release Night

This is our yearly release of Caught in a Rip (CIAR) Triple IPA! This year we decided to go one step farther and release CIAR’s brother Caught in a Haze (CIAH) Hazy Triple IPA. Both CIAR and CIAH will be available in 12oz cans as well as on tap! Six-packs of either triple IPA are $15.99 (plus tax and crv). Both Triple IPAs weigh in at 11.5% ABV and have a huge hop aroma and flavor. We repeatedly add our favorite hops (e.g. Nelson, Galaxy, Citra, Mosaic, Simcoe, …) to make the resulting beers have a massive citrus, tropical and stone fruit and background pine-like aroma and flavor.

CIAR is our West Coast-style monster Triple IPA that is blonde in color with noticeable hop haze and finishes crisp and dry with a significant bitterness on the finish to balance the alcohol sweetness. CIAH is a New England-style Juicy Triple IPA that is hazy blonde in appearance and is more-full bodied with a juicy fruity profile then its brother CIAR. CIAH is low in bitterness to allow the fruity sweetness to shine through.

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Introducing Our Sour Series Peach Blonde Sour

We have always been big fans of a well made barrel-aged sour beer, so in early 2017 we decided to allocate separate space in the brewery to start up our sour program. Like our barrel-aged clean (non-sour) program, these beer require significant time typically between 8-12+ months to develop and mature in the barrel before they are ideal to release. We purchased a large number of wine barrels and inoculated (adding of fermenting organisms) each barrel with varying proportions of wild yeast (brett) and bacteria (pedio and lacto) to achieve a complex blend of different acids causing sourness and complementary funk/barnyard/horse blanket (yes, this is how judges describe the flavors) from the brett.

After a long wait, it is time to finalize each sour beer, so we taste and blend the barrels that have our target flavor profiles and add any final ingredients. In this case, we added peach puree and then wait again for the beer to mature. Finally, we bottle and keg the beer and again wait for it to naturally carbonate.

After a long wait, we are stoked to announce the launch of our Sour Series and its first constituent Peach Blonde Sour! The resulting 7.4% ABV sour has a fresh peach aroma and flavor backed by complex lactic/acidic sourness melded with subtle notes of funk from the brett yeast. This sour is well balanced with all the flavors present by not adding excessive amounts of fruit that could cover up the hard work done by the bacteria and wild yeast over the last 18 months.

On Monday, November 5th our North Park location will have the initial pouring and this will be followed on Thursday, November 8th with the second tapping of the Peach Sour in San Marcos. Finally on Friday, November 9th, we will release 375ml bottles of Peach Blonde Sour for purchase for $14 (plus tax and crv). This is a small batch release, so we expect it to sell out quickly. Get your tasty piece of Rip Current history and while your here also pickup some bottles of Bourbon Barrel-aged Reserve Cuvee Blend #1!

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Introducing Murky Malarkey

On Wednesday, November 7th, we will be releasing our latest hazy IPA in our line-up, Murky Malarkey. It uses the super-popular hops – Idaho 7, Mosaic and Citra to create juicy citrus and stone fruit aromas and flavors while imparting very low bitterness. Unlike our previous hazy IPAs, this beer uses a special hybrid yeast that imparts a tropical fruity (pineapple-like) flavor to the beer to complement the orange, tangerine and apricot from the hops. Be one of the first to try this new hazy and let us know which hazy is your favorite.

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Night of the Rescue Buoy

After a Friday night celebrating hops with the release of our Triple IPAs, we thought it was appropriate to pay homage to those who prefer the dark. So on November 3rd, we are kicking off our night to celebrate malt in one of our biggest malt-forward beers… Rescue Buoy Imperial Stout. First, we have taken our award-winning Rescue Buoy and infused cold-steeped coffee from Ironsmith Coffee Roasters. Then we decided to use Coffee Rescue Buoy as the base used to integrate a number of unique and tasty flavors for each variation. These variations are small batch beers, so don’t expect to see them after beer week.

Both locations will have amazing tap lists including the following:

• 2017 Bourbon Barrel-aged Rescue Buoy Imperial Stout
• Coffee Rescue Buoy
• Coffee Rescue Buoy with dates and figs
• Double Shot Rescue Buoy with an additional dose of Ethiopian Layo Terraga coffee
• Coffee Rescue Buoy with coconut and toasted macadamia nuts
• Double Shot Rescue Buoy with toasted macadamia nuts
• SAN MARCOS ONLY: Double Shot Rescue Buoy with an extra dose of Ethiopian Walichu Watchu coffee

We hope you will join us with this celebration of all that is dark and malty! If you are a hop-head, have no fear their will be something on tap for you as well.

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Sour Night

We are continuing this very popular event from previous beer weeks, however this year we are highlighting Sour Night with the release of our first ever barrel-aged multi-culture (yeast and bacteria) sour with peaches! Our Peach Blonde Sour will be introduced on tap for the first time as a prelude to its bottle release on November 9th.

On November 5th in North Park and on November 8th for San Marcos, we will have our long awaited Sour Night. Both locations will have the following beers on tap plus many of your other favorites:

• Sour Series: Peach Blonde Sour
• Raspberry Margherita Tart with raspberry, tangerine, Tequila oak spirals, Meyer lemons, limes, and Pink Himalayan sea salt
• Raspberry Cucumber Lemonade Tart with raspberry, tangerine, cucumber, and Meyer lemons
• Raspberry Coconut Ginger Tart with raspberry, tangerine, coconut, ginger

For Sour Night in North Park, we are able to carry guest beers, so you can look forward to seeing some fantastic sour beers from our colleagues at: Council Brewing, Good Beer Co, Lost Abbey and New Belgium!

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San Diego Beer Week Schedule

As you likely know, Friday November 2nd starts our yearly celebration of Small & Independent craft beer here in San Diego county. While some might say every week in San Diego is beer week, those of us in the brewers guild strive to make beer week extra special. With that in mind, here are our tasting room events. Unless noted otherwise, all events will be held at both locations.

Due to the size and number of events, a more detail version of each event will be added as a separate post to the web site. Here is our SDBW schedule:

Friday, 11/2 – Triple IPA Can and Tap Release Night

Can release for Caught in a Rip and Caught in a Haze 12oz can six-packs and on tap!

Saturday, 11/3 – Night of the Rescue Buoy

Barrel-aged plus four special version of Coffee Rescue Buoy Imperial Stout will be on tap.

Saturday, 11/3 – Guild Fest at Embarcadero Marina Park South

We will be pouring Caught in a Haze Triple IPA and Raspberry Tart at Guild Fest downtown.

Monday, 11/5 – Rip Current North Park Sour Night

First chance to try our new Peach Blonde Sour on tap! We also will have 3 special tart version and guest sours pouring.

Tuesday, 11/6 – Sublime (San Marcos) Beer and Taco Pairing

Beer and food pairing of 8 Rip Current limited release beers with Sublime tacos selected by Chef James

Wednesday, 11/7 – Murky Malarkey Hazy IPA Release

On tap release for our latest Hazy IPA using a new hybrid yeast plus Idaho 7, Mosaic, Citra hops!

Wednesday, 11/7 – Rip Current & Craft Kitchen North Park Beer and Food Pairing Dinner

Very limited 4-course dinner pairing with Chef Caesar and our brewmaster Paul Sangster. Tickets available here on eventbrite.

Thursday, 11/8 – Hamiltons (South Park) Double Flight

Choose the hoppy or non-hoppy flight and your sure to try some new release surprise beers.

Thursday, 11/8 – Rip Current San Marcos Sour Night

We will be releasing our new wine barrel-aged Peach Blonde Sour on tap along with several special variations of our Raspberry Tart.

Friday, 11/9 – Night of the Barrels Featuring Barrel-aged Reserve Cuvee and Peach Sour Release

Prepare for a massive barrel-aged beer tap takeover coupled with a double special bottled beer release! The bottles won’t last, so plan to come early!

Friday, 11/9 – Urge Extravaganza

This will be a huge tap takeover with our friends from Urge including many rare gems.

Saturday, 11/10 – Brut IPA Collaboration w/Burgeon Beer Release

We are releasing on tap our recent collaboration with Burgeon Beer Company, a Hopped on the Brutwagon Brut IPA!

Saturday, 11/10 – Tap Takeover at Obriens (Kearny Mesa)

Another massive tap takeover with our friends from Obriens. Look for barrel-aged beers, hop monsters and something for you malty types.

Saturday, 11/10 – Collabapaloosa Indie Beer Event

We will have a booth at Collabapaloosa and will be pouring our new Hopped on the Brutwagon Brut IPA collaboration with our buddies from Burgeon Beer Company!

Sunday, 11/12 – Beer Garden at Torrey Pines (La Jolla)

Beer and food pairing festival with top chefs from around San Diego. Look for something very hoppy from us!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Summer Party … Hold This Date!

Mark your calendars for a fun event coming up at Rip Current on July 28th! Not only will we have food and special beers making an appearance, but it is also your first chance to experience two special packaged beer releases!

First, bourbon barrel-aged No Hope for Rescue Double Imperial Stout will be released in a new, smaller 500ml bottle.This crazy giant stout was aged in top shelf Heaven Hill bourbon barrels for 20 months allowing all the flavors of the Double Imperial Stout, oak and bourbon to meld harmoniously into a beer you won’t believe is 18.25%!

After producing a series of very popular hazy IPAs for the last year, we have listened to your feedback and are making a limited amount available in cans! Yes, we will be periodically releasing 12oz cans of your favorite draft-only beers starting on July 28th. Our first release is Foggy Nelson hazy IPA. This “foggy” beer features the highly sought after Nelson hop from New Zealand that blasts your palate with juicy tropical fruit flavors.

We hope to see you for an amazing summer bash and dual can/bottle release. Watch our social media feeds for more details over the next few weeks.

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Barrel-aged Black Lagoon Bottle Release on June 30th

 

After 2 years maturing in Heaven Hill bourbon barrels, we are thrilled to announce the release of our latest batch of Bourbon Barrel-aged Black Lagoon Scottish Strong on Saturday, June 30th! It will also be available on draft until the keg kicks.

Black Lagoon is our popular Scottish-style Strong Ale (AKA Wee Heavy) that has won many awards in international competitions including a Silver medal at the prestigious 2015 Great American Beer Festival and the 2018 California State Fair.

Black Lagoon has a silky smooth dark malt character with rich caramel, toffee and hints of chocolate and dark fruits. This beer is ideal for extensive barrel aging to round out the spectrum of flavors with bourbon and oak-derived goodness. We don’t rush the barrel-aging process, allowing our beer to blend in the bourbon flavors preserved in the barrel while extracting notes of coconut and vanillin deeper in the oak.

Come try it on tap and buy a bottle to go! This is a limited bottle release, so please don’t wait as they will go fast!

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Rip Current Brewing’s 5th Anniversary Celebration!

Born from a dream of two homebrewing craft beer lovers, Rip Current Brewing opened its doors in December of 2012. Back in those days, we only had a few beers on tap and grand plans to offer favorful examples of beer styles from around the world, barrel-aged beers and of course celebrate hops as much as possible. We could have never guessed how well our beers would be received, and the awards that would come to us in competitions culminating with the 2015 Very Small Brewing Company of the Year at the Great American Beer Festival. We are continuing on this mission, and are so thrilled to have had your support along the way.

For our anniversary, we are excited to showcase our best barrel-aged creations from over the last few years plus a line-up not to be forgotten. We will have fresh hoppy beers, creative twists on old favorites and even some previews of our sour program that is coming later in 2018. We will be celebrating anniversaries of both our locations on January 27th during normal tasting room hours. North Park will have just turned three and the mothership brewery in San Marcos will be five!

DISCOUNT EVENT PACKAGES

We will be offering a limited number of discounted 5th Anniversary Event packages for pre-sale on eventbrite. This package includes:

  • 5th Anniversary Celebration logo limited release wine-style glass (with 8oz sampling line)
  • Four drink tickets, each good for an 8oz barrel-aged or sour beer pour or a pint of a standard brew
  • Additional special beer 8oz pours during the event for the 5.5oz price
  • One raffle ticket with a chance to win cool prizes including some cellared bottles and merch.

SPECIAL BEERS ON TAP

Stay tuned to our social media feeds (@ripcurrentbrewing) for updates on the tap list, but the Special Anniversary Beers will include:

  • 2017 Woodford Reserved Barrel-aged Black Lagoon Scottish Strong
  • 2017 Coconut Bourbon barrel-aged Rescue Buoy Imperial Stout
  • 2017 Bourbon barrel-aged Dangerous Undertow Belgian Strong
  • 2016 Bourbon barrel-aged Rescue Buoy Imperial Stout with Guatemalan coffee and vanilla beans
  • 2016 Bourbon barrel-aged Vanilla Storm Coffee Imperial Porter (last kegs!)
  • 2016 Bourbon barrel-aged Rescue Buoy Imperial Stout
  • 2016 Single Barrel Storm Imperial Porter
  • 2015 Bourbon barrel-aged Black Lagoon Scottish Strong
  • 1-day old In the Curl Imperial IPA
  • Mocha Storm Chocolate Coffee Imperial Porter
  • Special blends from our sour program!

FAQs
Are there ID or minimum age requirements to enter the event?
All attendees MUST be at least 21 years of age

How can I contact the organizer with any questions?
Send questions to info@ripcurrentbrewing.com

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FiftyFifty Brewing Tap Takeover & Meet The Owner @ Rip Current North Park!

On Sunday, November 5th from 2-8PM, we are thrilled to welcome our friends from FiftyFifty Brewing Company of Truckee, CA to our North Park location. They are bringing an amazing line-up of their core and specialty program creations, including two rare variations of the world famous Eclipse Barrel-aged Imperial Stout!  Don’t miss this exciting opportunity to try so many of their beers on tap and to speak with FiftyFifty’s owner Alicia Barr.

We will have the following beers on tap (while the kegs last):

Eclipse Imperial Stout aged in Apple Brandy Barrels

Eclipse Imperial Stout aged in Maple Barrels

Spring Fever Blonde Ale (2015 and 2016 GABF medal winner)

Donner Party Porter (2012 World Beer Cup medal winner)

Session 267 Session IPA with Azacca Hops

Brewer’s Intent Series: Ferme de Montagne Barrel-aged Saison

 

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Rip Current Brewing’s Barrel-aged Beer Blast!

Each year our bourbon barrel-aging cellar produces some amazing beers that we gradually release when they are ready. Our philosophy is to allow the beer to stay in contact with the barrels for at least a year, so it extracts some of the complex, yet subtle flavors from the barrel. This requires patience and a generally slower release cycle, but we believe you can taste the difference. This year we produced the most barrel-aged beers in our history, and we hope that will continue into the future.

After the barrel-aged bottle and tap release, we save a small amount for us to enjoy 🙂 and a few kegs to bring each one back for a curtain call during our San Diego Beer Week barrel event! We think this year’s list might be the finest we have ever assembled and challenge you to taste them and let us know what you think!

This year’s barrel-aged beer blast will occur on two different dates, so you can hit both!

North Park – Friday, November 10th
San Marcos – Saturday, November 11th

We are stoked to offer the following tap list:

2017 Woodford Reserve Barrel-aged Black Lagoon Scottish Strong
2017 Coconut Barrel-aged Rescue Buoy Imperial Stout
2017 Barrel-aged Dangerous Undertow Belgian Dark Strong
2016 Coffee Vanilla Barrel-aged Rescue Buoy Imperial Stout
2016 Barrel-aged Vanilla Storm Coffee, Vanilla Imperial Porter
2016 Single Barrel-aged Storm Imperial Porter
2015 Barrel-aged Black Lagoon Scottish Strong

All of these amazing gems from the past will be pouring until the keg kicks. We expect several to go pretty fast so plan accordingly.

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Beer-tender Position Available in San Marcos!

We are looking for a new member of team Rip Current at our San Marcos location. The Beer-tender is the initial contact for visitors to our tasting room. The primary function of this position is to guide guests in beer selection and enjoyment, while providing exceptional customer service. The position is part-time, and grow into more shifts for the right candidate. We are seeking an individual who is willing to cover shifts as needed in addition to their regularly assigned weekly schedule.

Please review the full description of the position located here before applying.

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Coconut Barrel-aged Rescue Buoy Bottle Release!

On November 6th, both Rip Current locations will release Coconut Barrel-aged Rescue Buoy Imperial Stout! At the start of each locations’ tasting room hours, we will be offering of this amazing small batch beer on tap and in bottles to-go!

After 15 months slumbering in Heaven Hill and Woodford Reserve barrels, we introduced Bourbon Barrel-aged Rescue Buoy (BARB) in October. We aged a small amount of BARB on freshly toasted coconut chips and the results were amazing. Rather than just drink it ourselves, we decided to bottle some up and to have it on draft during beer week! That is right, you can try it on tap (while the keg lasts!) and then buy your bottles to go.

Rescue Buoy (the base beer) has received several medals in the Imperial Stout category including at the 2017 Los Angeles and San Diego fair international beer competitions! Coconut Barrel-aged Rescue Buoy leads with a burst of coconut followed by bourbon, molasses and chocolate aromas and flavors. The mid-palate satiates your palate with dark malt character including: dark chocolate, molasses, fig, dates and hints of coffee. The finish reminds you of the start with a return of coconut and bourbon hints of oak barrel tannins.

This was a small batch, so we are not doing pre-sales. We have a very limited run of bottles that will be sold on a first come, first satisfied basis.  We don’t expect they will last very long, so don’t wait.

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Rip Current Cans in the Market

After 4 years of making draft beer for the San Diego County marketplace, we decided to put our beer in cans in 2016. Throughout 2017, we have been packaging our most popular brands in six-packs of 12oz cans and working to expand our distribution to make it easy for you to find our brews.

As this photo shows we now have six cans designed, and the first five have been available in the market for some time now. We hope you will ask for our beer at your favorite restaurants, craft beer/liquor stores and supermarkets, so we can continue to expand and bring our beer to your neighborhood.  We have over a 100 locations selling our cans across San Diego and Orange County!

Our brightly colored, outdoor activity themed cans include: Lupulin Lust Double IPA (green), Java Storm Coffee Imperial Porter (red), Bodysurfing Belgian-style Blonde (yellow), Choppy Surf Czech-style Pilsner (dark blue) and Off the Lip IPA (light blue). But wait that is only five, what about the sixth can? During 2018, we will be releasing additional beers in cans, so stay tuned for announcements.

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Caught in a Rip Triple IPA Release during SDBW

On Friday November 3rd, San Diego kicks off its annual salute to craft beer by hosting San Diego Beer Week (ok, its really 10 days but who is counting).  We are very proud to be a member of the San Diego brewing community and take this opportunity to make something special for our patrons to help with the celebration.  This year, we are introducing our crazy hop monster, Caught in a Rip Triple IPA on the opening day of beer week.

Caught in a Rip is an 11.2% beast of a San Diego-style IPA featuring all of our favorite hops from both hemispheres. Seriously, we have hops from Australia, New Zealand and of course the USA to maximize the complexity of this very fruit-forward IIIPA.  Despite its huge ABV, this beer is light blonde in color and has a clean, bone dry finish that is only sweetened by the amazing fruit flavors from the hops.

If you haven’t tried it, be sure to stop by our tasting rooms during beer week. We only make this beer once a year, so you don’t want to miss having your share.

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Barrel-aged Rescue Buoy Bottle Release!

After 15 months slumbering in Heaven Hill and Woodford Reserve barrels, we are stoked to announce the release of Barrel-aged Rescue Buoy Imperial Stout in wax-dipped, 22oz bottles AND for sampling on tap starting Oct 20th! This year’s Rescue Buoy has received several medals in the Imperial Stout category including at the 2017 Los Angeles and San Diego fair international beer competitions!

The bourbon barrel-aged Rescue Buoy has a silky smooth dark malt character featuring dark chocolate, molasses, dark fruits (prune, date, fig) and coffee, all surrounded by complex bourbon flavors and oak tannins with fleeting notes of vanillin.

Come try this amazing beer while it lasts and take a few bottles home to enjoy with friends later.

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New Website

We have updated our website!

Enjoy the new look and be sure to check back to the news section for updates on all of the cool stuff happening here at Rip Current Brewing.